I write about the Internet technologies and upstarts that are disrupting advertising and media faster than ever. I'm living this disruption, so I might as well write about it, too. I spent nine years as chief of BusinessWeek's Silicon Valley bureau writing about the leading edge of technology and business, and I continue to do so for a variety of publications. Follow my posts here by clicking the "+ Follow" link under my name. You can also find me at my personal Web site RobHof.com, follow me on Twitter (robhof), Circle me on Google+, subscribe to me on Facebook, and email me (robert.hof@gmail.com).

Since launching in May, Curious.com has amassed some 3,000 instructional videos from more than 400 experts looking to pass on their knowledge in bite-sized video chunks, and eventually make a little money. They range from how to handle a chef’s knife to how to make various tennis shots, mostly by people who aren’t teachers but know their particular stuff.

Now, the Menlo Park (Calif.) company aims to bring on well-known brands to lend some name appeal and proven expertise. Today, Curious announced its first co-branded collection of lessons with Sunset, the Western-living magazine owned by Time WarnerTime Warner. The magazine has created Sunset Seminars on Curious.com, starting with 19 lessons in three categories: holiday meals, wine essentials, and container gardening.

Each features Sunset editors presenting short, interactive videos that include, like most Curious video lessons, brief exercises along with extras–in this case, recipes, product and book suggestions and, not surprisingly, a Sunset magazine subscription offer. Sunset wine editor Sara Schneider, for instance, provides lessons on how to judge various kinds of wine and pick them out in the wine aisle. Viewers, or “learners” as Curious calls them, can ask the instructors questions and even get feedback on their own creations.

Curious was cofounded by CEO Justin Kitch, Chief Technology Officer Thai Bui, and engineering chief John Tokash. Kitch and Bui were cofounders and Tokash an early employee of the small-business website platform Homestead that IntuitIntuit bought in 2007. In a way, Curious is a Web 3.0 take on Homestead, this time providing a way for teachers pro or amateur to become entrepreneurs by giving them tools such as editing services and of course the platform itself to provide quick, casual ways to learn about subjects. People can sign up for lessons, mostly free for now. While Curious eventually plans to provide ways for teachers to charge, it’s providing varying amounts of its own “coins” for free to users initially to pay for lessons.

In recent months, some other large brands Kitch wouldn’t name have sought out Curious to see if they might also do some co-branded lessons. Kitch says the company is in “active discussions” with brands he wouldn’t name, though he says they could range from media companies such as the Golf Channel to retailers such as Home DepotHome Depot to celebrities and sports stars–anyone who could credibly teach something.

That’s why Sunset, known for its how-to articles and books, was a natural–that, and the fact that Sunset headquarters are across the street from Curious’ office. For now, the Sunset effort, a separate “collection” on the site, which also features a half-dozen other collections such as language and crafting, is a pilot. It’s intended to help Curious determine how well brands can do lessons like these and how they’re best presented on the site. “The question is whether Sunset can drive people to spending 30 minutes learning something,” says Kitch.

At first glance, instructional videos look like a crowded space. There are the fast-growing academic-oriented sites such as Coursera, Udacity, and Khan Academy. Perhaps closer to home, there are how-to sites such as wikiHow, Instructables, and Demand Media'sDemand Media'seHow. Kitch contends the former require more commitment than the more casual lifelong learning he’s aiming at, and most of the latter’s dependence on advertising for support means they require a lot of traffic that often results in low-quality ads. And of course there’s Google'sGoogle's YouTube video site. ”You can find amazing gems on YouTube,” Kitch concedes, but he says they’re hard to find and don’t offer interaction with the creator beyond comments.

So Kitch thinks there’s room for Curious’ bite-sized lessons of 5 to 15 minutes each. The number of lessons viewed has been growing quickly, Kitch says, from 400,000 at the end of September to 800,000 today. Kitch’s near-term goal is to reach 1 million visits a month. He reckons Curious will be about halfway there by year-end. A mil a month, he says, is enough to make it worthwhile to test out ways to make money.

Although Curious hasn’t decided on particular monetization methods, Kitch guesses that the main vehicle will be micropayments, perhaps a coin per lesson, or less-than-micropayments such as, say, $20 for a Sunset video lesson collection. Kitch is also experimenting with tips, bundled lessons at a discount, and the ability to sell products. One teacher who does wilderness survival lessons, for instance, sells a wilderness survival kit. Not least, he thinks getting one-on-one assistance from teachers or other experts is something enough people will pay for. Kitch expects to get a better sense of what will work best in the next quarter or two.

Perhaps surprisingly, one thing Kitch doesn’t plan to do is run advertising. “We made a pledge not to do advertising,” he says. “It doesn’t work for this [niche] content. You have to go so ‘Gangnam Style’ to get enough traffic that you can’t do this kind of content.” Of course, we’ve heard this no-advertising pledge before, even from Google, so things could change. But Kitch sounds adamant about making alternatives work, as he did with subscription-based Homestead.

The company, with 16 employees, has raised $7.5 million from Redpoint Ventures, Intuit Chairman Bill Campbell, Kitch himself and others.

Post Your Comment

Post Your Reply

Forbes writers have the ability to call out member comments they find particularly interesting. Called-out comments are highlighted across the Forbes network. You'll be notified if your comment is called out.